Mhada plans up to 10% price cut on hundreds of unsold Mumbai flats

MUMBAI: Unable to find buyers for hundreds of its flats across Mumbai, including those overlooking the Kanjurmarg landfill and the sea, the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada) has initiated a proposal to reduce prices of the unsold inventory by up to 10%

MUMBAI: Unable to find buyers for hundreds of its flats across Mumbai, including those overlooking the Kanjurmarg landfill and the sea, the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada) has initiated a proposal to reduce prices of the unsold inventory by up to 10%. If approved, the revised rates will come into effect when the Mumbai Housing and Area Development Board (MHADB) puts the apartments back on the market after Diwali under its First Come First Serve (FCFS) scheme.

Mhada initially offers newly constructed homes through lottery draws. Flats that remain unsold after repeated attempts are subsequently transferred to MHADB, its Mumbai housing arm, which markets them under the FCFS category, allowing applicants to purchase them without participating in a lottery.

Several such apartments have remained without buyers for years, including what was billed as Mhada’s most expensive flat — a 1,500-sqft-plus apartment at Tardeo’s Crescent Tower, priced at ₹7.58 crore. The apartment was put up for sale again under the FCFS scheme in February but failed to attract any buyers.

Similarly, several hundred of the 1,221 flats at Kannamwar Nagar remained unsold after Mhada’s August lottery draw. The authority has housing units across several other locations in the city that have also failed to find takers.

“If the proposal is cleared, prices of several flats will come down by up to 10%. However, the reduction will not necessarily be uniform across all the unsold apartments,” the official said.

This is not the first time Mhada has attempted to make its unsold inventory more attractive through price reductions. In April, the authority reduced prices of flats at Kannamwar Nagar by 7.5%. Following the revision, prices of 480 tenements, which were earlier in the range of ₹1.46 crore to ₹1.48 crore, came down to between ₹1.35 crore and ₹1.37 crore.

However, even the price reduction, coupled with free parking slots, failed to generate a favourable response. One of the major deterrents for prospective buyers was the project’s proximity to the Kanjurmarg dumping ground, which has been associated with high methane emissions. A 2026 study by the University of California ranked the landfill as the world’s 12th-highest methane-emitting site.

For years, applicants have also questioned the affordability of homes marketed by Mhada, with many arguing that the prices are beyond the reach of the very section of society the housing authority aims to serve. High prices, less-preferred locations and proximity to the landfill are among the reasons behind the poor response to several projects.

The authority has consequently accumulated an unsold inventory of nearly 400 flats across Mumbai. Mhada’s authority will now examine the proposal to revise their prices. Once it receives approval, MHADB plans to invite applications for the apartments under the FCFS scheme after Diwali.